JLR has officially confirmed that Gerry McGovern, the company’s until-now-much-lauded Chief Creative Officer and the driving force behind both Range Rover’s much-loved and acclaimed transformation and Jaguar’s horrific relaunch, will leave the company at the end of March 2026.
The announcement ends nearly four months of damaging speculation following reports in December 2025 that McGovern had been escorted from the building. At the time, JLR issued a mealy-mouthed PR-speak denial: “It is untrue that we have terminated Gerry McGovern’s employment.” The company maintained this line as recently as early March before finally confirming his departure this week.
A Legacy of Triumphs and Tears
McGovern, who turns 70 in September, leaves behind an undeniable design legacy. His hits include the game-changing 2011 Range Rover Evoque, the critically acclaimed 2019 Defender resurrection, the 2022 Range Rover (frequently lauded as one of the most elegant SUVs ever made), and the earlier Freelander that helped define the compact luxury SUV segment.
Looking at those examples more closely, Freelander was always an orphan, an unreliable and unloved child. It was sold on entry-level JLR price alone, and almost none remain on the road. Evoque language developed further and Velar and the 2022 Range Rover carry that same JLR-speak, but it wasn’t the design language that has been JLR’s failure, it is the miserable reliability and longevity that has seen the group’s decline accelerate.
Range Rover’s pop-out door handles are known to fail inconveniently the moment the warranty expires. At $4,000aud a corner, an expensive fail. The Ingenium 2.0L diesel has a DPF failure built into the engine. If the car is used for mainly short trips the DPF becomes clogged, rejecting the fuel sent to it and is unable to reach burn-off temperature. It allows unused fuel through cylinders to contaminate oil causing catastrophic big-end failure.
The company problems run deep right across all brands.
Inside sources tell GCB that Jaguar is in such dire straits that regional managers were herded into a top secret bunker for an early view of the final “00” concept, and were told “this is the hill on which Jaguar will live or die”. With McGovern present, those words have proved prophetic.
His final chapter at JLR proved to be his most divisive.
In November 2024, Jaguar unveiled a 30-second teaser ad featuring models in outlandish, colourful outfits — and not a single car. While some thought it imaginative and futuristic, the right-wing media and their opportunistic trolls swung into action. The backlash was immediate and brutal. Ultra-right-wing gossip rag, The New York Post, called it “idiotic and woke corporate virtue signalling” (a common MAGA cry). Well, it would, wouldn’t it. The equally dysphoric ex-MAGA Elon Musk weighed in on X, asking Jaguar’s official account: “Do you sell cars?”
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ABOVE: The Type 00 concept, Range Rover Evoque, classic E-Type, MKII, Sir William Lyons, Sir Joh, and the SS Jaguar meets Type 00
Let’s talk Musk for a moment:
Musk is a man who has continually over-promised and under-delivered, and whose trillion dollar pending pay packet hangs on 10 million FSD subscriptions, another disaster in the making. He, and Tesla, have form. Tesla, whose last release was widely mocked as a “dumpster” and was late by years, and has thousands of unsold units rotting away in lots and disused malls, yes, that Tesla.
The same Tesla, cancelled Model S and Model X, and whose range spelled S3XY until the hideous Cybertruck launch, so now just spells 3YC, whatever that means. The deranged Musk used the equally unbalanced US president to flog cars at the Whitehouse. Are you seeing a pattern? These nutters critiqued a brand with a long and gracious legacy and whose models include the E-Type and MKII, neither of which ever drove themselves into walls or ran red lights.
But, back to Jaguar.
The subsequent reveal of the Type 00 concept in Miami — angular, aggressive, and drenched in camp “Miami Pink” — did little to quiet the nutter critics. McGovern, characteristically defiant, declared from the stage: “Jaguar has no desire to be loved by everybody.” He probably should have channeled the statesmanship of Sir Bill instead of the dictatorship of Sir Joh.
It was a bold stance. Perhaps too bold for a brand haemorrhaging credibility by the hour. The man is now eating his less-than-humble words.
The Quiet Departure
Strip away the PR veneer, and McGovern’s exit statement reads like a hostage video. “It has been a great privilege to work at JLR across two extraordinary decades,” he said, through what we can only imagine were gritted teeth. “The dedication and passion of thousands of people across the business have made these brands what they are today, and I am enormously proud of what we have built together.”
Translation: “I’m out, it weren’t me wot dun it m’lud”, and I’m lawyered up to me Saviled cravat in Silks.
Treacherous JLR CEO PB Balaji — widely reported to have orchestrated McGovern’s execution — offered the kind of bland corporate eulogy that translates to “I’m covering my ar$e”: “Gerry’s creative leadership, vision, drive and passion have left an indelible stamp on our brands.”
An indelible stamp, indeed. Whether Jaguar can scrub it off remains to be seen.
McGovern will now establish his own creative consultancy. Given his genuine track record with luxury SUV design (a segment that shows no signs of slowing), he’ll probably land on his feet. The man can draw a Range Rover. It’s the other stuff — the MAGA-stained pink concept cars, the car-free adverts, the “we don’t want to be loved” bombshell — that sank him like a rust-laced ladder chassis.
What Now for Jaguar?
My dear, darling, sweet Jaguar, your days are numbered. The timing tells you everything you need to know. In the same week JLR confirmed McGovern’s ass-kickage, the company released a panicked advertising campaign that does something the Type 00 reveal conspicuously avoided: acknowledge that Jaguar once made cars people actually wanted. Sadly, those buyers died of old age.
The ad features the satisfying rumble of combustion engines — a sound McGovern’s all-electric fever dream was explicitly designed to eliminate. It celebrates heritage instead of torching it. It shows actual vehicles instead of androgynous models in avant-garde fashion.
Let’s be clear Macca didn’t decide Jags direction on his own, but his thorough ass-kicking probably hides a solid gold handshake as a silent nod to being the fall guy for a cowardly board and CEO who have the ultimate say. They’re the ones paid big bucks, and they’re the ones to whom ire should be directed.
Coincidence? Please.
Chris Thorp, JLR’s Chief of Staff and Corporate Affairs Officer, will babysit the design division while the company searches for McGovern’s replacement. Whoever takes the job inherits a poison chalice: honour the design legacy that made Range Rover a genuine status symbol, while somehow steering Jaguar’s electric reinvention away from the MAGA-engineered cultural dumpster fire it has become.
McGovern himself perhaps said it best in a 2015 interview: “There are a lot of people who think I’m the anti-Christ but the thing I’d turn around and say is I’ve never been responsible for a car that hasn’t made money. Ultimately, who’s the judge of good design? It’ll be the consumer.”
For Jaguar’s forthcoming electric range — assuming it ever arrives — that judgement day is coming. And based on everything we’ve seen so far, the jury looks hostile.
More Jaguar and Land Rover Stories
- Jaguar’s New Era Begins – A Last Toss of the Dice
- Jaguar – The Genius of Electric Type 00 in Dramatic Pictures
- Iconic SS Jaguar Meets Future Type 00 in London for 90th Bash
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Alan Zurvas is the founder and editor of Gay Car Boys, Australia's leading LGBTQI+ automotive publication. Before launching GCB in 2008, Alan's automotive writing was published in SameSame.com.au and the Star Observer. With over 16 years of hands-on car reviewing experience, Alan brings an honest, irreverent voice to every review — championing value and innovation over brand loyalty.
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